


seulgi vs the merry murderess 3

by psycholeka



Category: Red Velvet (K-pop Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Horror, Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, Gen, Ghosts, Haunted House, Irene - Freeform, Murder Mystery, joy, reve festival teasers, seulgi - Freeform, yeri
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-18
Updated: 2020-01-18
Packaged: 2021-02-27 09:54:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,587
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22205176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/psycholeka/pseuds/psycholeka
Summary: youve been cordially invited to seulgi and her new husband’s housewarming! A 300 year old house filled with angry ghosts? What could go wrong?
Kudos: 3





	1. Irene

**Author's Note:**

> this was my first time like writing something and publishing it so like be nice cause i’m fragile thank yew

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Irene was bored.

_**Irene** _

_You can say Irene had a perfect life. A perfect face, a perfect family, perfect friends, perfect dresses, perfect shoes, you name it, she had it. Yes, Irene was perfect, but she was bored. With perfectness came stability and that stability was stifling. Her feelings extended outside of her mind into the humidity in the summer air further suppressing her until she could pass out. At one point, early in her life, she realized she had everything but freedom. With no way to search for it, all she could do was sit there in the stifling summer heat year after year._

•••

For the life of her Seulgi could not find her husband. They’d put down the last box and he’d simply disappeared. Something about seeing a statue garden when he was here last. She’d relegated herself to becoming familiar to the house seeing as her husband “bought” it without her. The shadows had shadows as she walked through the seemingly never ending corridors. Her husband told her on the drive there that the house had been standing since the 1700s. It used to belong to his family but somewhere along the line the papers got lost and it became public domain. The bank bought it and he and his family spent years before they’d ever met trying to buy it back. Seulgi and her husband met in college. Back then they only had a single english class together as freshmen. She remembers thinking how he had looked a bit older than 19 to be a college freshman, but she decided that it was none of her business. It took them no time at all to become friends and eventually lovers. They had known each other for the better part of 4 years and in her mind it was a no brainer to say yes when he asked to marry her.

•••

_Her mother begged far too often Irene thought. Begged her father to listen, Begged her siblings to obey, and most of all begged Irene to find at least one man suitable to marry before her father forced her to marry some foreigner. Irene had no interest in any of it. she was more than happy to watch her perfect best friend Jennie enrapture another man. she had grown content with it. Honestly, she enjoyed listening to the way her friend described her “catch of the week”’s anger at being slighted by a woman. Irene figured as long as Jennie was there then she would be fine. She trusted Jennie more than her own mother, so when Jennie introduced her to “a friend” she trusted him too._

•••

The house, despite its age, barely needed any fixing. It struck Seulgi as odd when the inspector told her a week after they’d moved in that the pipes had barely begun to rust. A house 200 plus years old with pipes younger than her... electrical systems up to date... it was just odd. Her husband had told her it had been deserted for at least 50 years so if the city hadn’t kept up with it who did? She’d waved the cable man off hours ago and she still couldn’t find her husband. It had been another 30 minutes before she saw his blonde hair dart past the window in the kitchen. She remembered helping him bleach it in the bathroom of her old apartment. He complained for hours that the bleach burned but he never doubted her skills. In the end the bleach was almost perfect (she missed a spot on accident). “Baby!” He’d run into the kitchen out of breath. “I think there’s an animal living in the sculpture garden. I’ll take care of it just don’t go towards it just yet.” She echoed a hesitant be careful as he grabbed gardening shears from a random box and ran back outside. Seulgi had only seen the garden from afar but she ached to see the sculptures up close. She figured she would, just not anytime soon. The kitchen had grown quiet without her husbands energy. Quiet enough to hear the grandfather clock in the far hallway. Quiet enough to hear the balls of her socked feet tap against the hardwood floors as she sat, and quiet enough to hear the swish of tulle against silk.

•••

_Jennie introduced them in the summer. To Irene, Elias was a cool breeze to the heat. Breaking up the monotony of the season with new things from across the sea. Irene clung to him in the fall refusing to let go of the feelings he brought forth. By winter she realized the feeling she found in him was the freedom she had been searching for. Freedom from her mother's nagging, from her father's piercing gaze, from majority of her “friends” muffled laughter and whispers. Jennie, like the perfect friend she was, was happy for Irene. She was there when Irene and Elias struck the deal. She would marry him as long as he took her back across the sea when he left again. He agreed. Come spring, they were married. It had taken a year to get their things together but there Irene was, on the dock of a boat headed across the sea. Jennie was there to see her off. Irene figured Jennie would be the only thing she would miss from her life but in exchange for the new world that waited for her? She would do it again._

•••

Seulgi was convinced she was going insane. it started two weeks ago. She heard something in the hall behind the kitchen but when she went to go check there was nothing there. She had been out cleaning the pool when she saw something in the water. she was sure it was a woman’s reflection but not her own. She had found an oversized chess board towards the back of the property and correctly arranged the pieces and was ready to play against herself when she had to take a call. When she turned back around she’d noticed a pawn had been moved. Seulgi brought it up to her husband but he brushed it all off as oversights. She was listening to her own skirts (she had been sitting). It actually was her own reflection (her hair had been in a ponytail since they moved in and the reflection’s hair brushed past her shoulders). She had moved the chess piece before the call (this one she couldn’t quite prove wrong but her gut told her different). So there she was. In the statue garden waiting for something anything to happen. Then she heard it, the giggles. Her husband was at work so it couldn’t have been him. Sitting up she had realized the laughter stopped. It was almost as if they were waiting for something.

•••

_This was a mistake. This was all a mistake. She should have never left home. She should have never left Jennie. The regret poured out of her as she silently cried in her hidden spot. If they were to find her she would surely die. it had taken 3 years for her husband to show his true face. He was a killer. She knew that now. the children in the village kept disappearing. the locals here were whipped into a frenzy over witches just like they were decades before. They were desperate to keep the peace and if killing the one foreigner was the way out then so be it. there was no way to prove that she wasn’t a witch she could barely speak the language outside of a hello goodbye thank you. There was no getting through to them. she would die here in this foreign country away from her family... from her best friend. Irene screamed as her hair was being yanked pulling her body out of her hiding place. she wasn’t quiet enough. The hallway was long and her husband made sure she felt every inch of it. He was speaking a language she barely understood but the venom sneaked it way into her pores, she knew she would die tonight. The pain of betrayal stung behind her eyes. this was her husband how could he blame his wrongdoings on her? She had only found out 3 days ago and he had managed to turn the whole town against her and paint himself as innocent. None of this was her fault. She’s paying for it though._

_•••_

_There were women at the chessboard. One older and one younger, Seulgi figured. The younger had pink hair and an upturned nose. The older had her back turned and her hair cascaded down her back. The younger opened her mouth to laugh again when her eyes landed on Seulgi. She adjusted her scarf and yelled “HI!” The older’s spine straightened with a speed Seulgi didn’t know existed. She was faster than she looked because in less than a second, Seulgi was staring into her eyes. The venom in her tone wrapped around her neck “Stay away from him.” was the only warning Seulgi got before the woman disappeared into thin air. It was only after Seulgi had run screaming into the house did she realize the woman was speaking korean._

_•••_

_The water was so cold and Elias so strong. He held her shoulders and head while the townsmen watched, wanting to make sure the job was done completely. Irene clawed at his arms but it was no use. The small gasps of air she’d gathered did nothing to rid her lungs of the panic stuck there. In her throat was more water than air. She could’ve sworn the pool had a bottom, she watched Elias build it. Her feet slipped she couldn’t find any traction. It was too cold to think too cold to do anything other than fight for her life. Her fear mixed with the pool water in her throat as she gargled. Irene never knew that you could cry underwater. a week later she woke up beside the pool as if nothing happened. She tried calling out for Elias but he wasn’t there… no one was. The house stood deserted. she was sure she had died so why was she still here? was there no afterlife like her mother had said or was she there and this was some twisted version of it? She decided to wait. She would wait for Elias to come back to explain himself. And she sat there for years unmoving. Waiting. When Elias finally decided to come back it was with a new wife. He had a new name, a new haircut, new clothes and most of all a new woman. It was then that Irene then realized she was in fact dead. She had spent years waiting on a man just for him to trap another woman. Irene had never been as angry as she had been in that exact moment of her new eternity._


	2. Joy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Joy was too stubborn for her own good

_**Joy**_  
_Joy said ’I love you’ a lot. she never really meant it, unless it was her mother or siblings. She realized it was wrong to profess love when she didn’t mean it, but sometimes it was just easier to say than just saying thank you and potentially hurting someone’s feelings._  
 _Right?_  
 _Either way Joy always told people she loved them. It wasn’t hard. They were just words. She honestly had better things to do with her time than being sincere. There were parties to attend, new people to meet, drinks to… illegally drink._

•••  
She was sure of it now. The house was haunted. The woman who scared Seulgi was the same she’d seen in the pool that one day. Had she known there were ghosts in this damn house she’d never agreed to live here.   
Seulgi knew she couldn’t bring this up to her husband, he’d just dismiss it all. no she needed to figure out what was going on. By this point she’d known the entire floor plan of the house from the attic to the basement except a singular room that stayed locked. It upset her how her husband had literally forced her away from the door with a lazy excuse of ‘there aren’t any windows’ to make her stop thinking about what was inside.   
She figured the room could wait until after she solved the ghost problem.  
Seulgi knew there were at least 2 ghosts, but she didn’t know if that was all of them. It was driving her insane because she hadn’t seen them in weeks. Quite frankly she was starting to believe she’d imagined them because of how much she missed her own friends.  
Then she heard it. That soft swish of fabric. it could only be from a person wearing a dress and she had on jeans. Seulgi turned and ran, in the mood for a chase.  
•••  
_The music was loud. Her heartbeat even louder. She couldn’t fathom how much she’d drank and spun in circles, but she was having fun. And standing there in the chaos of the party, like the eye of the storm, was the most beautiful man she’d seen in all of her life. Or she thinks… she is in fact drunk off her ass and breaking several laws including her mother's curfew._  
 _She thinks he’s breathtaking. Joy thinks he looks like what jack the ripper would look like had he fled to america and was immortal. Maybe he was a vampire actually?_  
 _Joy can actually feel the champagne fill her throat as his eyes shift to stare at her. Through her coughing she couldn’t see him laughing, so when she came back up for air she was more than confused on why he disappeared._  
 _“Dance with me.” a voice behind her said. Stumbling she turned around and there he was. “Matthew.” he said. “My name is Matthew.”_

_•••  
_ There’s 3 ghosts. Seulgi knew this and accepted it as a fact. She just needed to find one. Find one and if she managed to get past the shock of seeing an actual ghost tell them to leave. Her husband had been gone on a business trip for 2 days now. He was supposed to be gone for a month, so as of today she had 29 days to figure this out.  
She was compulsively washing dishes when she heard the kitchen chair scrape across the floor. The entire room was too cold for it to be a summer day and the house was so big and drafty that she didn’t have to turn the fan on.  
“stop chasing me.” 

_•••  
Matthew was nice. Matthew was stable. Matthew was boring. Joy figured she had more fun chasing the bottom of a glass than she did with Matthew. But still… there was something about him… she couldn’t exactly leave him in the dust now could she?  
They partied (her more than him). They laughed (her more than him) They loved each other (him more than her). Yet she was bored. He seemed content The house was big, maybe too big and drafty. Joy hated it. It made her feel trapped. The entire building stood as an ominous reminder of her inability to say no. She could feel time move differently here. Her life had all but stopped in the year she had been married. Matthew had urged her to not go into the city because women kept disappearing. He was scared she would be next. Joy envied her friends not stuck in a relationship tied to a man because they had nothing better to do.   
Needless to say she hated her husband. And Joy knew he knew about it.  
“If you knew any better you’d leave.” She heard someone say, but there was no one there.   
That same voice she’d heard for weeks giving the same warning but worded differently each time. Joy wasn’t stupid. Her mother was very superstitious so from a young age she knew ghosts and things of the sort were real. It wasn't easy coming to terms with that, knowing the place where she rested her head was haunted, no but she just decided to ignore it as much as she could.  
•••  
_ She's wasting time. Seulgi knew this and yet she still wasted time. If the other two ghosts stayed hidden what use was it for her to keep looking for them? And yet here she was at the chessboard searching.   
“Irene’s not going to show” Joy said her voice lilting up in her little 20s accent. “I thought you stayed in the house.” Seulgi mumbled. She had noticed that in the days she'd known Joy the ghost, she only stayed within the confines of the building  
“Please,” Joy quipped. “I go wherever Irene isn't. She scares me.”   
Seulgi snorted. How could a ghost get scared they're already dead. “Who’s Irene again?”   
“Black hair.”  
“Huh?”  
“Black hair green eyes.”  
Seulgi remembering the second week her and her husband moved in and getting accosted by the woman with the green eyes “Oh.” Seulgi breathed  
She realized how Joy could be scared of her.  
“What did you do to her?” Seulgi asked. A woman like that exudes power, if you made her mad it was your fault. “Nothing.” Joy whispered “I just… didn't listen.” Joy sighed. _  
•••  
“FOR THE LOVE OF GOD LISTEN TO ME! HE’S GOING TO KILL YOU!” Joy scoffed at that “Just because he killed you does not mean he’s going to kill me.” she said. “For all I know you could be lying I’ve never seen him act like the way you’re saying. Whatever happened to you has absolutely nothing to do with me.” The room turned cold as Joy stopped to turn around.   
“Fine. Do not listen to me. Figure it out on your own like I had to, but when the time comes do not yell for me. I will not come.” Joy scoffed turning back around to the window. “As if i would need it.” She felt the room warm back up and Irene was gone.  
That was two weeks ago. She should have listened  
•••  
_Joy had gone quiet reminiscing. Seulgi asked her question and got empty air in return. Joy had basically just told her she was stubborn which was something she could already tell. Every time she asked Joy had gone quiet and once she was done visiting the past. She really hadn't figured out how Joy died so she’d stop asking. “I’d tell you but i don't think you’d listen to me. We’re the same,” Joy remarked. “You're smarter than me though. But he’s smarter than all of us...I have to go Irene is in the garden.” Seulgi jumped up to go try and find Irene when her brain made the connection. It felt like ice falling down her spine  
Was her husband the reason why Joy died? _  
•••  
She had been screaming for an hour. Where was Irene. She needed Irene. She found the bodies. Fifteen at least. The women in the city who were all missing there they were. In the basement. Where the FUCK was Irene? Her husband would be home any minute and she didn't know what to do. Her husband was a murderer Irene was right and now she was ignoring her. Joy jumped as the door slammed.  
She was too late  
Joy tried to run out of the basement but it was no use. There he was in the doorway. His silence made her blood run cold. “Joy… what did you do?”  
What?   
“What do you mean what did I do? What have YOU done? These bodies, they're all the missing women aren't they?”  
“Joy you killed these women I had nothing to do with it.”  
“Matthew get out of my way i'm leaving. You’re scaring me.”  
She brushed past her husband. Joy had made it to the top step of the basement when her husband grabbed her ponytail and threw her down the steps.  
She woke up what felt like years later, chained to the pipes on the wall, blood dripping onto her collar from the back of her head. “You were so reckless.” Matthew shuddered. “Killed all those women and for what? Cause you were bored? Jealous? For what Joy?” He laid bricks down as he talked. She knew where this was from. The Cask of Amontillado. She’ll be bricked in here forever. Until she died from starvation or dehydration.   
They were simple hand cuffs chaining her to the wall. She got to work on breaking her thumb.  
“Joy you’ve put me in a rough spot here-”  
“Fuck you.”  
“You’re a murderer. You’ve killed fifteen women in one month-” Three more bricks.  
“Fuck. You.” A grunt to cover the crack  
“Joy-”  
“FUCK YOU!” Joy screamed as she pushed out of the hole on the wall.  
She ran up the stairs. The house was so big but those years of being alone in this house meant she knew her way around, but she had lost so much __blood that she stumbled her way out. Disoriented she found herself in the backyard instead of the driveway. “JOY!” Came a roar from the patio door. She kept moving. “JOY STOP! DON'T MAKE ME DO THIS!”_  
 _She didn't hear it. She didn't hear the gun cock back._  
 _“JOY I LOVE YOU I'LL FORGIVE YOU COME BACK!”_  
 _She kept moving._  
 _The gun banged loudly. And she fell to her knees. “No.” she squeaked out. The adrenaline had worn off. Her thumb throbbed, her body hurt, her head was splitting. She was done._  
 _She woke up in the grass. Irene’s eyes bored into her own. “We’re stuck together now. An eternity of nothing.”_

_  
  
  
  
  
_   
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it took me 12 damn years to write this and for that im sorry lmao. as always im @uhleekuh on twitter.

**Author's Note:**

> come yell at me at on twitter about how i couldn’t figure out how to include wendy @uhleekuh


End file.
